SKIN is an ambitious initiative of 20 partners in 14 countries in the area of Short Food Supply Chains (SFSCs). It intends to systematise and bring knowledge to practitioners, promote collaboration within a demand-driven innovation logic and provide inputs to policymaking through links to the EIP-AGRI. SKIN will build and animate a community of about 500 stakeholders, with the strategic objective of setting up, at the conclusion of the project, a European association permanently working for the improvement of SFSCs efficiency and for the benefit of stakeholders and growth in the sector. The community will be built and animated around the identification of good practices in short supply chains across Europe. Partners will scout, analyse and classify a significant number of cases in different countries. “Best practices” (at least 100) will be systematised, processed into highly usable formats (including video and page-flows) and made accessible to stakeholders via the web (following the EIP AGRI formats) and through the set-up of regional nodes, to allow a deeper penetration of existing knowledge into practice. The work on good practices will also allow identifying key issues (hindrances or opportunities) around SFSCs. Such issues will be the main themes of 6 “innovation challenges workshops” the purpose of which is to stimulate stakeholders to propose new ideas for innovation based research or innovation uptake. These will be supported in a coaching phase where consortium partners deliver guidance to stakeholders for the full development of those innovative ideas. SKIN puts significant efforts in dissemination, to reach as many stakeholders as possible, and exploitation, to plan post projects developments in the form of a permanent association that would give continuity to the activities launched with the project (community expansion, circulation of good practices, promotion of research based innovation and linkages with the EIP and policy making instances).

The overall aim of the thematic network ‘OK-Net Arable’ is to improve the exchange of innovative and traditional knowledge among farmers, farm advisers and scientists to increase productivity and quality in organic arable cropping all over Europe, in order to satisfy future market demand. To achieve this, 'OK-Net Arable' has three specific objectives: 1) to create a European network of well-functioning farmer innovation groups representing the best examples of co-innovation by farmers and researchers. The network of farmer innovation groups will serve to exchange experiences in the area of arable crop production and test the innovative end-user and education material developed in the project; 2) to digest and synthesize the considerable knowledge available from the reservoir of scientific and practical knowledge in the area of organic arable farming and to identify the best methodology in learning and knowledge exchange. Based on this easily understandable education and end-user material will be developed; 3) to create a platform for knowledge exchange across Europe unique in organic farming, offering both innovative education and end-user material as well as offering opportunities for farmer-to-farmer, advisor-to-advisor or researcher-to-advisor-to-farmer learning. The multi-actor approach is prominent in this proposal: (1) at EU level with scientific partners and farmers' associations jointly coordinating the work packages; (2) on the local level with farmers, farm advisors and scientists cooperating in farmer innovation groups. The whole consortium covers in total 13 countries from all corners of Europe giving a well-balanced representation of different climate, geographical and socio-economic conditions.

The overall aim of AgriDemo-F2F is to enhance peer-to-peer learning within the commercial farming community. The project will utilize the experience of different actors and involve practitioner partners throughout the project to deepen understanding of effective on farm demonstration activities (multi-actor approach). In a first step, we will conduct a geo-referenced inventory of open commercial farms that engage in demonstration activities in Europe, detailing the sectors, themes and topics on which they provide expertise, and describe the mediation techniques they apply. Case studies will be selected to perform an in-depth comparative analysis. Important dimensions in selection are: 1) a wide-spread geo-graphical coverage within Europe, 2) representative for EU-agricultural sectors, systems and territories and 3) low tech versus high tech in mediation techniques. Case studies will be described, analysed and compared on 1) their network structure (actors, roles and governance characteristics), and 2) the mechanisms and tools used for recruitment, interaction and learning. Furthermore, effectiveness of the different approaches within the case-studies will be assessed through an evaluation of the extent and nature of learning. Both regional and international multi-actor meetings will use the results of the cross comparative case study analysis to i) identify a set of best practical approaches for both the on farm demonstration of research results (science driven) and the spreading of best farming practices among practitioners (innovation driven) and ii) recommendations for AKIS governance and policies on how to support effective on farm demonstration activities. The empowerment of both the commercial farming and policy community to uptake these best practices will occur through structuring the project results and farm demo showcases on the AgriDemo-Hub, an interactive, user oriented, web-map application.